"What normal school students are bringing us to make certain decisions. We will review the administration, we will retake control of it, and we might even suspend the Tiripetío Normal School for one year," the governor said.
"This is a boarding school maintained with government resources, and we can't spend more money from the government for them to carry out thess types of actions, [blocking highways, seizing buses]" he said.He also reported that he has instructed the Secretary of Education to withhold salary payments of striking teachers [Section 18 of the National Coordinating Committee of Education Workers] who do not meet their responsibilities and he invited teachers to do their jobs, saying that
"we want in the classroom giving classes."The Tiripetío Normal School is the most combative one [of eight] in Michoacan, and one of the most militant in the country. The students often protest proposed legal changes (state or federal), particularly those related to education. They have always have demanded-and gotten-that state resources not stop flowing and that they have an assured teaching positon when they leave school [a guarantee given when the rural normal schools were established in the 1920's, after the Mexican Revolution].
Their protests are often highly active: blockading highways, seizing tollbooths, schools and government headquarters; as well as marches and demonstrations. Often, too, they hijack buses to protest or to go on a trip. The last [two] case[s] occurred on October 1 and 2, when they hijacked buses to go to the march commemorating the Tlatelolco massacre in Mexico City [and again on Oct. 13, to protest the education reform, which will require they take standardized, competititve exams to obtain a teaching position]. Spanish original